ZUMO & ZIMMER FRAMES

ZUMO = juice,  ZUMO DE NARANJA – orange juice. 

We had to be up early this morning to get our breakfast out of the way before a Skype conference with the RBL in Spain - the noise of my juicer in the background would have been too much!

 If you saw my P for Poppies Post on April 18^th you will know that we are members of the RBL Tenerife Branch. Our two Case Workers needed a training update, and Skype is a much better option than a trip to the Peninsula. It’s also cheap, whereas tickets and accommodation would make a large hole in the branch budget. Isn’t technology wonderful?

And to add ZEST to my day, Jean brought me a whole carrier-bag full of fresh lemons. More Lemon Curd? – (see my recipe page for how to make it.)

ZAP ZONE! A friend asked last night if we had ever eaten at the Atlantido Restaurante in Las Galletas. We had, but it’s gone now. ZAPPED by over-ZEALOUS bureaucracy. Demolished. RaZed to the beach. Another victim of the Spanish law PLAN DE COSTAS that says any building too near the sea must go.

Although the food was good and the view amaZing, it had probably been built illegally. 

The same cannot be said of some of the little cottages that this Draconian law has deemed unnecessary – those were people’s homes, built decades before the tin gods in Spain moved the goal-posts.
Look up "Tenerife village demolished" on Google images and weep.

ZIMMER FRAMES have you noticed you hardly ever see one these days? People go straight from walking sticks to those motoriZed wheelchairs that ZOOM along the pavements as if they own them, ZIPPING in and out of innocent pedestrians and mowing down small children. 

I thought these vehicles were supposed to be speed-restricted? I reckon some of them have been souped up.

ZENITH = above a trailer in an unofficial depot near us is this Z-car - it's been there a good while. Z at the end of its registration number means it’s about 25 years old. The owner must hold it very dear to go to these lengths to deter thieves.

MORE DEMOLITION

This notice appeared in Las Galletas last week beside the houses scheduled for demolition.
It translates as:
PLAN OF THE COASTS
Maintenance and Conservation of the Coasts of the Province of Tenerife.
PROJECT CO-FINANCED BY THE EUROPEAN UNION
Many people believe "Co-financed" means "Dictated by" and I think they could well be right.

A fortnight ago a solitary villa was pulled down and the blocks hauled away.

On Tuesday the pink block of flats was reduced to rubble. Today we could almost have parked where it had been.

The white building with the concave un-plastered wall to its upper storey is still there, keeping the wind off the Italian restaurant next door. Will that be standing next week? Your guess is as good as mine - there was a Spanish restaurant by the promenade two months ago on what is now empty beach.

You might not consider the loss of a few houses in Las Galletas to be a big deal, but it's happening along the entire coastline in all Spanish territories.

It isn't only the big hotels or modern blocks of ugly apartments, some of which we wouldn't mourn if they went.

It's not even the foreign pensioners who built their villas in all good faith only to have them torn down.

Every fishing village could be affected. Every family who have lived near to the sea for generations, and who take their living from it, could be affected by the draconian law that has taken away their rights.

Look up this site for the story of CHO VITO, one such village in Tenerife http://elespritudechovito.blogspot.com.es/

CHO VITO BEFORE






AFTER

and the Policia having to hold back the homeless.

Yesterday nine of the remaining residents were on hunger strike - let's hope someone listens.




....and on another note - if you want cheering up, look at the new addition to my "Verses" page.